Persona 5: Recovering
by SilverJ0
Summary: Spoilers for November. Simply my take on the events after the interrogation scene and the consequences of someone going though something like that.
1. Chapter 1

p class="MsoNormal"Sae Nijima let out a sigh as she looked down at the phone of the leader of the Phantom Thieves. Just what the hell had these kids gotten themselves wrapped up in? Tonight had just been one crazy revelation after another with the thieves leader's, Akira Kurusu, crazy testimony about how they managed to steal their targets' desires by using a world created by people's cognition. As well has her sister apparently being a member of said group, Goro Akechi somehow being the perpetrator behind the Mental Shutdowns and Psychotic Breakdowns, that there was a talking cat who could turn into a bus for some reason, and that now the said thieves needed her help since if she didn't cooperate it would cost their leader his life. As much trouble as the group of thieves had caused her the last several months, she certainly did not want any of them to die. They were all still just kids after all./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Trying to push everything she had learned over the past couple of hours to the back of her mind, Sae scanned back over the messages she had received via Akira's phone through someone named Alibaba…? She was just going to ignore that for now and hope to get a proper explanation later since there were more pressing matters at hand. She had already shown Akechi the leader's phone, for whatever that did, so she now cautiously made her way back to the interrogation room. Upon arriving, she saw the guard that was stationed at the door earlier still standing there back straight with his hands behind his back. However, he didn't seem to be paying attention as he kept looking around and didn't even notice Sae until she was only a couple of feet away./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Ah, Nijima-san," the guard greeted after finally spotting her. "Is something the matter? I thought you were finished with your interrogation."/p  
p class="MsoNormal""No, everything is fine for now," Sae replied, "However, has anyone else shown up tonight after I left?"/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Um, no not anyone I can recall," the guard answered a bit confused./p  
p class="MsoNormal""I see…" Sae half mumbled to herself. Despite Akechi having headed this way earlier it seems he never arrived so Akira should've avoided any confrontation with him, which was good especially if Akechi was one of the ones behind the Mental Shutdowns. Though how exactly she beat him here was beyond her…/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Uh Nijima-san?" The guard asked interrupting Sae's thoughts, "Are you sure everything's alright?"/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Hm, I'm afraid it isn't actually," Sae said returning her attention back to the task at hand, "In fact I believe your very life may be in danger."/p  
p class="MsoNormal"Upon hearing this the guard stared at her incredulously believing her to be joking at first, but after seeing her serious expression his initial thoughts seemed less than accurate. "Are you being serious here Nijima-san?"/p  
p class="MsoNormal""I wouldn't lie about a something like this," Sae replied sternly while smiling internally to herself as it appeared that she got the guard to believe her. She needed a way to get a rid of the guard and this was the fastest thing she could think of, though she wasn't necessarily lying about his life being in danger. If Akechi really was the true culprit, he most likely wouldn't think twice about disposing of someone who would witness the death of his next potential victim. "I'd probably go into hiding for the next couple of days if I were you, no make that the next couple of weeks just to be safe. I'm still unclear of all the details, but it'd be best to avoid this group at all costs if you can."/p  
p class="MsoNormal""I- yes…! But what about...!" The guard stuttered slightly directing his gaze to the interrogation room door./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Don't worry, I'll make sure everything is taken care of," Sae assured him, hoping the guard would finally take the opportunity to leave./p  
p class="MsoNormal""I-yes of course! Thank you Nijima-san!" The guard quickly bowed and hurriedly walked down the hallway with panic written all over his face. Sae waited a full minute after the guard was out of sight before letting out the breath she had been holding. She took one more careful glance down the hallway before turning the lock on the door and slowly pushing it open. Taking a quick look around, nothing appeared to have changed from when she was last in there. The table, the two chairs, the syringe discarded haphazardly on the floor, and the beaten figure of Akira Kurusu sitting slouched in his chair looking half-awake staring down at his bruised wrist. He didn't seem to notice her come in so she slowly made her way over to him and lightly shook his shoulder. "Kurusu-kun, are you still awake?"/p  
p class="MsoNormal"It took a moment for him to respond and even then he didn't seem completely coherent. "Hm, Nijima-san?" He blearily looked up to the prosecutor standing at his side, "I'm assuming you being here means we got through to you?" He asked with a cocky grin on his face, though it seemed to waver a bit due to the exhausted look in his eyes./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Something like that," Sae stated seriously not wanting to waste any more time than they already had, "Think you can stand?"/p  
p class="MsoNormal""I should be able to…" Akira answered slowly as he cautiously pushed himself up from his seat despite it looking painful do so as he kept trying to suppress the grimace that threatened to form on his bruised face. He eventually managed to stand up, only to immediately fall over. Luckily, Sae was fast enough to catch him by his arm before he collided with the ground. "Easy there," Sae said trying to pull Akira back up into a standing position as carefully as possible, "You don't want to irritate your bruises more than you already have."/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Right…" Akira blearily responded as he tried to stand up again along with her, only to almost fall over one more. Sae sighed. She then draped his arm over her shoulder as best as she could, given their height difference, so she could support some of his weight. "Is this better?" she asked./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Yes… Thank you…" Akira replied looking away slightly embarrassed that he was having to rely on someone he only really got to know that night to just walk down the hallway, though given the current situation there wasn't anything he could do about it. "Sorry, it's just that my leg doesn't seem to want to work right now," he let out a forced chuckle in an attempt to lighten the mood. Though, it didn't do much as Sae could easily guess why his leg didn't want to work and instead decided to just silently lead him down the hallway as quickly as his bad leg allowed him. He was putting little to no weight on his right leg. Sae tried to support that side of him to the best of her ability, hoping it would help them move a little faster. Eventually, after about 10 minutes -even though it felt like several hours- of painfully trudging down hallways, up fire escapes and peering around corners, they successfully made it outside into the frigid November night. However, not wanting to risk Akira being seen, Sae cautiously moved him over to an alleyway and carefully leaned him up against a wall, and he was thankfully able to support his own weight against it./p  
p class="MsoNormal""I'm going to call a taxi," Sae stated pulling out her cell phone, "Just try to at least stay awake until I can get you home." Akira gave a small nod in response, trembling a bit as he tried his best to keep himself upright against the wall. Any strength he had to stay awake was quickly fading as he felt himself slide lower and lower down the wall. Noticing this Sae helped lower him to the ground as gently as she could having him sit on the ground with his back leaning against the wall. Akira gave a small nod as thanks while attempting to keep his eyes from shutting. They wait silently like that hoping the taxi will arrive soon, with Sae continuously looking around to make sure that there are no unwanted onlookers present. Once the cab makes its long-awaited arrival, Sae cautiously lifts Akira off the ground and guides him over to the vehicle. The action gets an odd look from the driver, but they decide it's better to look away and stay silent as Sae and Akira get into the back seat. Sae quickly gives the driver Leblanc's address once they enter the vehicle and they all drive off silently into the night./p  
p class="MsoNormal" /p  
p class="MsoNormal"strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"uAuthor Notes:/u/strong/p  
p class="MsoNormal"strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"Hey everyone, hoped you enjoyed what there is of the story so far. This is my first time posting fanfiction online so here's hoping it goes well. This mostly happened due a combination of boredom and trying work on my writing skills for some personal projects in the future. As well as me being a sucker for angst, because Atlus just gave everyone a gold mine over here with that part of the game. I'm sorry protag but you're going to suffer… again… Anyway, I'm not sure how long this story will be. Probably won't be too long, but who knows, I made get carried away and write way more than anyone ever needed hahaha… Well thank you to anyone that read this and I hope you'll look forward to more!/strong/p 


	2. Chapter 2

p class="MsoNormal"Sojiro Sakura stood in his empty café gaping at the TV as the plate he had been drying falls from his hands and shatters against the floor. The TV was currently displaying the news which had just announced that the leader of the Phantom Thieves had committed suicide. Most people listening to this would probably be a bit shocked and maybe even let out a shout of anger or joy depending on their opinion of the thieves. However, they would all inevitably go back to whatever they had been doing before, soon forgetting about the news entirely or simply thinking the thief was a poor fool who wanted to go down in a blaze of glory. The main reason they would think this was because they were outsiders looking in and could never truly understand the thieves' plight./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Sojiro was not an outsider. While he wasn't aware of this for a while, the kid he had been watching for the last several months just happened to be the Phantom Thieves' Leader, and the only reason he found out was from sheer dumb luck. Sojiro mentally cursed himself for not being able to figure out that fact sooner. Especially due to his adopted daughter's, Futaba Sakura, sudden change in attitude in regard to the outside world. One week she could barely talk to him without a door between them and the next she wanted to go to the beach with friends. He mentally kicked himself for not even considering that thieves who could "change peoples' hearts" had something to do with her sudden change./p  
p class="MsoNormal"While he was thrilled to see his daughter being out of the house and interacting with kids her own age, he definitely wasn't happy that they were involved in something so dangerous and that they had hid it from him for so long. Though, he couldn't exactly blame them for not wanting to tell him since he probably would've done the same in their situation, and as much as he wanted them to stop being thieves, he knew it was too late to back out whatever they had gotten themselves into. He just simply told them to be careful and hoped that they had listened./p  
p class="MsoNormal"According to what the news was saying, they clearly had not. Sojiro could only stand there shocked with the words from the TV still not fully registering. There was no way that the kid could be dead, right? He knew for a fact that cocky punk wasn't going to go down that easily. It just wasn't possible… Sojiro would never tell the kid this, but he had really come to care for him. Plus, despite being a major nuisance sometimes, the kid had really been a huge help around the café when he needed him. He was also grateful that he was willing to be friends with Futaba since the two of them, along with the rest of their odd group, seemed to all get along, and he was pretty sure that all of them were responsible for getting Futaba's Uncle to stop harassing him for money…/p  
p class="MsoNormal"Oh god Futaba! It's bad enough that one of kids he was looking after was supposedly dead, but it anything happened to her as well… He didn't even want to think about. Finally coming somewhat to his senses, Sojiro turned off the TV and flicked off the lights before storming out the door and barely remembering to lock it. Practically sprinting down the street, Sojiro burst through his front door gasping for air. It had been way too long since he had ever run like that./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Futaba…! Are you here…?!" He managed to shout between gasps. Unfortunately, he didn't get a response. However, he had saw her come home earlier that day cradling their cat, Morgana, in her arms and shutting herself in her room without a word. While being in her room for most of the day wasn't an unusual action for her, it was becoming less frequent of late, as she would usually stop by Leblanc to at least say hi to him and Akira, if to not just to squat outside as practice for her "main quest of seeing all of Tokyo" as she would put it. Plus, she would usually at least say hello to him when she came home, and it was really odd that he hadn't seen Akira for the entire day./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Mentally chastising himself for not seeing the many warning bells going off all day, Sojiro made his way down to Futaba's room and slowly opened the door after finding that it was unlocked. It was hard to fully see the interior of the room since the only light source currently on was the glow of the computer screen, but he managed to make out his daughter sitting like a gargoyle on her desk chair typing furiously on her keyboard with the cat sitting next to her looking at the computer as if he could understand all the letters and numbers flying across the screen. In an attempt to get her attention, Sojiro turned the overhead lights on hoping that it would shift her attention to him. It didn't even manage to get the cat's attention./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Futaba," he said in a normal tone. This time he got Morgana to look at him who then started meowing at Futaba who simply stayed glued to her screen./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Futaba," he tried again slowy making his way over to her desk./p  
p class="MsoNormal"…/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Futaba!"/p  
p class="MsoNormal"The sudden shout next to Futaba more than got her attention and she responded in the form of a high-pitched yelp and nearly falling out of her chair. She quickly grabbed onto her desk to prevent herself from hitting the floor, which caused her chair to turn enough so that she could see Sojiro standing next to her with a rather annoyed expression on his face. "Oh… Hey Sojiro…" She finally managed to reply sheepishly once she got some of her bearings back./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Care to explain what was just on the news?" Sojiro asked, trying his best to keep calm but wasn't doing the best job since his voice had a mixture of annoyance and worry in it./p  
p class="MsoNormal""So, you saw that…" Futaba looked to the cat, who somehow looked as worried as she as she was, as if he would somehow have the answers but just let out a meow in response./p  
p class="MsoNormal""So…?" Sojiro began, his patience running thin. "The kid- Akira… He's not…" He couldn't bring himself to finish the statement./p  
p class="MsoNormal""I know it seems bad now," Futaba stated finally gathering enough courage to look at her adoptive father, "but I promise he'll be back as soon as he can. You'll just have to trust us for now, please." She finished staring at him resolutely while somehow having a pleading look as well./p  
p class="MsoNormal""But how can you- I mean…" Sojiro let out a sigh after not being able to finish his question. There really wasn't anything he could do in this situation. "Alright, but you better be sure he gets back okay, and stop pulling all these crazy stunts after this one! You're going to give me a heart attack one of these days."/p  
p class="MsoNormal""No promises on that last part," Futaba replied with a small grin, "but I know we'll get him back!"/p  
p class="MsoNormal"As if it was waiting for them to finish their conversation, the doorbell rang leading for the three of them to look out into the hallway. Still wanting to be cautious, Sojiro tells them to wait there as he briskly makes his way over to the door and slowly opens it. Nothing could've prepared him for what lied beyond it, though./p  
p class="MsoNormal""What are you- What the hell!" Since he didn't open the door all the way at first, he only saw Sae Nijima which led him to open it all the way out of shock and anger that she had the nerve to show up at his house this late. That rage soon turned into concern after seeing the beaten figure of Akira Kurusu being supported by Sae./p  
p class="MsoNormal""There's no time to explain, he just needs your help right now," Sae stated carefully handing the barely conscious Akira over to Sojiro who took him while looking extremely lost on what happened to the poor kid. "Just keep him safe and make sure no one finds out that he's here," Sae finished and then she turned around and left, leaving Sojiro with way more questions than he had answers. A small groan originating from the kid, whose weight Sojiro was supporting, was enough to get him out his small daze that he directed his attention to Akira's sorry state./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Mm… Oh… Hey Boss…" Akira finally said is if he was just realizing where he now was./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Don't 'Hey Boss' me you punk! What the hell happened?!" Sojiro chewed him out, mostly out of concern about how he even managed to get beat up like that./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Mm, well a lot of things happened. You're going have to be more specific," Akira replied, still somehow having enough energy to give a cocky smirk to his caretaker./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Now isn't the time for-!"/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Akira!"/p  
p class="MsoNormal"Sojiro was interrupted by the sudden shouting of Futaba as she was running down the hallway towards them with Morgana right behind her. They both made a sudden stop at the sight before them. "Oh no… Akira what did they do to you?"/p  
p class="MsoNormal""I'm fine," Akira reassured. His voice was very shaky." Nothing I…couldn't handle…"/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Like hell you're fine!" Sojiro shouted, his patience finally running its course. He could clearly see Akira struggling to stand even when he was supporting most of the kid's weight. "You look half dead and you can't even walk on your own!" He continued to rant as he started to basically drag Akira to his room. "You're staying where I can keep an eye on you so don't try some other stupid stunt that could get you killed tonight."/p  
p class="MsoNormal"Thoroughly stunned at Sojiro's sudden outburst, Akira just stared at him blankly and let himself be dragged along. He figured Sojiro would be mad but he didn't think he would be this mad. Though Akira knew it was because he cared about him even though he knew Sojiro would never admit to it. They eventually made it over to Sojiro's bedroom, with Futaba and Morgana following them, and he carefully sat Akira on his bed. Turning to leave the room he looked over to Futaba, "I'm going to go see if the clinic is open. Go get the first-aid kit in case it isn't and keep an eye on him."/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Ah, yes!" Futaba responded somewhat startled as she was previously deep in thought looking over the beaten boy. Satisfied with her answer, Sojiro tuned to run out into the night hoping that nothing else bad would happen while he was gone./p  
p class="MsoNormal" /p  
p class="MsoNormal"strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"uAuthor Notes: /u/strong/p  
p class="MsoNormal"strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"Hey everyone, I'm back with another chapter. I was hoping to get this out earlier but then college happened so that was fun. In terms of an update schedule, I'm probably just going to try to at least update once a week if not more since I'm not planning for this to be too terribly long, but once again we'll see. Also, I'm putting the notes at the beginning this time since I wanted to inform everyone there's a very brief mention of suicide in the beginning of this chapter, but it's only like a sentence and it runs pretty much the same way of how it did in the game. So, if it was no problem in the game for you it'll be no problem here. Just thought I'd mention it just in case. Anyways I hope you all enjoy!/strong/p  
p class="MsoNormal"strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;" /strong/p 


	3. Chapter 3

p class="MsoNormal"Having left Morgana to look after Akira, Futaba set out to obtain the first-aid kid. She couldn't quite remember where it was, so she spent some time rummaging through kitchen cabinets in order to locate the item she needed. Once she found it, she let out a small sound of triumph and ran off to Sojiro's bedroom where Akira and Morgana were. Upon returning, Futaba let out a small gasp upon seeing that Akira was no longer sitting on the bed like how she had left him and was instead was lying across the bed his legs dangling off the side of it./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Mona! I thought I told you to look after him?!" Futaba scolded, setting down the first-aid kit before she quickly made her way over to the boy's side with concern written on her face./p  
p class="MsoNormal""I am! He just suddenly fell back like this," Morgana replied defensively. "Don't worry. He just fell asleep. I think the exhaustion of everything he's been through finally caught up with," he finished looking over his friend worriedly./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Alright I'll forgive you this once, but if I catch you slacking off again you're going to have the face the punishment of one hundred bear hugs!" Futaba exclaimed already reaching for Morgana./p  
p class="MsoNormal""No! The last time you did that I nearly suffocated!" Morgana scurried back to where Akira's head was, just outside of Futaba's reach. Futaba let out a small satisfied chuckle before looking back down at Akira's sleeping form. As much as she wanted to talk to him and see how he was doing, it was probably for the best that he had managed to fall asleep. She frowned upon looking at his bruises again. She could only see the ones on his face and the marks on his wrists as if he had been struggling against something. She shuddered to think off all the unseen ones that his clothes concealed./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Deciding that Akira's current position did not look comfortable at all, Futaba took it upon herself to place him properly on the bed. She started by leaning down and slipping off his shoes and setting them beside the bed. She then grabbed his legs and attempted to place them on the bed as carefully as she could manage. Their height difference and her lack of arm strength was not helping the situation./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Uh what are you doing?" Morgana asked, looking down at the struggling Futaba./p  
p class="MsoNormal""I'm trying to move him so he doesn't have half his body hanging off the bed," Futaba replied, starting to make a small amount progress in her task. "Don't just sit there! Lend me a hand or paw or whatever you got!"/p  
p class="MsoNormal"Not entirely sure how exactly he was supposed to help in his current form, Morgana decided on grabbing onto one of Akira's pant leg with his mouth, since it was difficult to get a grasp on anything with cat paws, and attempted to help pull Akira up as best to his abilities. Once they managed to somewhat get him onto the bed, Akira's position on the bed still looked far from comfortable since his legs were bent towards his torso due to his head laying in the middle of the bed versus the top. Wanting to fully complete her task, Futaba carefully climbed onto the bed. She then as gently as possible picked Akira up by his shoulders and slid him up to the top of the bed, with Morgana trotting out of the way to give him some room. However, before she could fully get him up there, a small groan escaped from the boy's mouth and his eyes slowly blinked awake./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Akira!" Futaba shouted worriedly as she quickly placed him back down on the bed before scrambling off it. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you." He really shouldn't be doing anything but sleeping in his state./p  
p class="MsoNormal""No, it's fine," Akira reassured, attempting to sit back up but doing a poor job of it. "I'm sorry for suddenly dozing off like that."/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Don't apologize for that," Futaba hovered worriedly over him, afraid he was going to pass out again./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Morgana sighed as he looked over his struggling leader. "You really shouldn't try to be sitting up right now."/p  
p class="MsoNormal"Ignoring their concerns, Akira continued his painful plight. "See… its' fine…" He managed to say after he finally sat himself up. Morgana simply shook his head and padded over to sit next to Akira with Futaba still looking over him worriedly./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Are you sure you're really okay?" Futaba asked thoroughly concerned./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Yeah… I'm fine…" Akira replied with the smallest of grins./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Futaba didn't believe him one bit. His eyes looked so unfocused and he looked like he was about to pass out again. He was shaking slightly and the bruises in his face looked unbearable at best. Looking over him made a small fire of rage erupt inside of her. She and the rest of their group of the thieves knew how dangerous this plan was when they had come up with it and that if they messed up even one step their leader would be gone. Despite this fact, Akira had agreed to the plan since it was really the only thing they could come up with to get out of the situation they had been cornered in to, and even then, Akira agreed to the plan simply because he trusted them. This group was with friends, his family, people who he could depend on no matter what. He believed in them in everything they did together and he knew that they were going to get him out./p  
p class="MsoNormal"However, despite all their meticulous planning, none of them had accounted for the current state of their leader. The thought never even crossed any of them that he would've been beaten. Abused. Tortured. The fact that they even had the nerve to torment someone they were planning on killing anyway was sadistic. Thinking about what he must've gone through made Futaba want to curl up in a corner and cry and just pretend everything was okay, but that was just ignoring the problem and she knew she couldn't do that. She needed to be here for Akira./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Not knowing what exactly she should do to help him at the moment, Futaba settled for the one thing she knew she could do./p  
p class="MsoNormal""I'm sorry."/p  
p class="MsoNormal""What for?" Akira tilted his head to the side, genuinely confused of what she could be apologizing for./p  
p class="MsoNormal""For making you have to go through whatever they did to you!" Futaba practically cried back. "They hurt you, and none of us even thought of that possibility!" She couldn't hold her tears in any longer, "I'm sure we could've come up with something else if he thought of this happening, but we didn't and… and…"/p  
p class="MsoNormal""Hey, it's okay," Futaba's sudden outburst left Akira stunned but not enough where we couldn't give a proper response. He put a comforting hand on her shoulder and continued, "I'm here now and I'm alive and safe. I know it's hard right now but we'll get through this like we got through everything else. So please don't blame yourself for how it ended up. Not even I considered that this would happen. It was just an unavoidable step in our plan."/p  
p class="MsoNormal""As much as I hate to admit it he's right," Morgana added, looking down sadly. "Even if we had thought about this turn of events their probably wouldn't have been much that we could've done about it due to the main goal of our plan. Still, if we ever happen to run into the people that did this to you I'll claw their eyes out!" He finished with his tail puffing out in anger./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Glad to know I have your cat powers on my side," Akira replied, ruffling the fur on Morgana's head which led to many protests from their feline friend./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Seeing their exchange helped Futaba calm down and a small smile formed on her face. Akira was hurt but he was here, and he was still their leader. He just needed time to recover before they could all go out and beat up the jerks that did this. Just like they always did./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Before anyone could say anything else, they heard the front door open along with an "I'm back" coming from Sojiro, which prompted the three of them to look out into the hallway and briefly wait for him to come through the doorway./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Hey, the clinic was closed but I went by the café and grabbed a set of your nightclothes," Sojiro announced holding up the clothes./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Thanks boss," Akira replied attempting to stand up and take the clothes from his hand. In doing so, he nearly fell onto the floor due to his bad leg, luckily Futaba was fast enough to prevent that from happening./p  
p class="MsoNormal""What the hell do you think you're doing?!" Sojiro snapped, grabbing the first-aid kit left on the floor and storming over to them. "You couldn't even stand ten minutes ago so what makes you think you can do it now?" Sojiro continued to rant as he set the clothes and the kit in the bed as he reached over and began unbuttoning Akira's school blazer as he doubted the kid had enough energy to do it himself./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Haha… Sorry…" Akira smiled sheepishly, resigning to let himself be taken care of, since if he tried to refuse it'd probably just frustrate Sojiro even further./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Futaba lend me a hand and open up the first-aid kit," Sojiro instructed as he continued to fuss over Akira./p  
p class="MsoNormal""Ah, right!" Futaba snapped into action and flung open the kit and began to pull out bandages and gauze wraps, as well as ointment to clean wounds with. She then ran off to the bathroom to grab some washcloths. Upon returning, Akira already had his blazer and undershirt removed. She tried to not look at him like this, but she couldn't help but see the bruises that covered his arms and surrounded his rib cage as if he had been stepped on and kicked, over and over. She felt her tears trying to come back./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Pushing them back for now, Futaba went over to help Sojiro with Akira as best as she could. It ended up not being very easy. Every time one of them went wipe off one of his bruises of dirt or dried blood, it was obvious he was trying to resist from shying away from it. As if just lightly touching it brought about an unbearable amount of pain. It hurt to watch him suffer like that, especially once they saw the black, boot shaped bruise throbbing on his right thigh. No wonder he couldn't walk./p  
p class="MsoNormal"They all stayed silent during this process, either simply not knowing what to say or simply choosing not to break the tense mood. Once they dressed Akira's wounds and somehow managed to get him into his nightclothes, he fell asleep again as soon as his head was rested on the pillow. He looked so much more peaceful with the mercy of sleep taking him over. Sojiro sighed as he looked down at him./p  
p class="MsoNormal""We should probably just leave him be for now. I'll try and get the doctor over here tomorrow," Sojiro shook his head as he turned to leave before looking back at Futaba and Morgana. "You all coming or what?"/p  
p class="MsoNormal"In response the question, Morgana simply padded over to Akira's side and curled up next to him. They would have no chance of moving him until Akira woke up again. The sight made a small smile appear on Futaba's face before she turned to Sojiro with a determined look. "If Mona's staying than I'm staying too!"/p  
p class="MsoNormal"Sojiro opened his mouth to say something, but he ended up just closing it again and shaking his head. It was practically impossible to dissuade Futaba once she set her mind on something. He smiled inwardly. She was just like her mom in that regard. "Alright, but don't try to wake him. I don't want any complaints that they couldn't sleep from anyone, and if anything else happens tell me right away. Okay?" He had already planned on checking on Akira throughout the night, but it was always helpful to have as many sets of eyes as you could./p  
p class="MsoNormal"Futaba gave him an affirmative nod before telling him to "wait right there" as she ran off into the house to come back with a chair from their kitchen table. She set it in front of Akira's sleeping from and presumed her normal sitting position before turning to Sojiro and giving him a thumbs up. Sojiro gave a light chuckle in response before wishing them a good night and turning out of the room. Silently hoping that the rest of the night would leave the poor kid alone./p  
p class="MsoNormal" /p  
p class="MsoNormal"strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"uAuthor Notes:/u/strong/p  
p class="MsoNormal"strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"Hello everyone, sorry this chapter is a little later than my at least once a week update I said last time. College eats up half my time and motivation to do anything hahaha… Also, I've noticed that each chapter is slightly longer than the last. I can't tell if that is a good thing or bad thing. Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter and I'll do my best to get the next one out in a timely manner. Also, don't worry Sojiro. The rest of this night will be nice to Akira. Can't make any promises about any future nights though. /strong/p 


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